by Perry Rhodan
"Yes, sir," Tako said quickly. He did not even bother to switch off his telecom, and Rhodan and Bell saw how be vanished from the spot where he had just been standing.
Lieutenant Klein was a triple agent. First, he was an agent for the International Intelligence Agency-this was his profession. Second, he was an agent for peace and intentional understanding-this was his inner personal conviction. And third, he was an agent of the Third Power, whose ally on the outside he had become. Klein, together with his colleagues Kosnow the Russian and Li the Chinese, had joined Tai-tiang's troops in their withdrawal after their unsuccessful-attempt on Rhodan's base. But now Klein had risked leaving the safety of the military camp and was advancing again close to the wall of the energy screen around the Third Power's base. He must have a very valid reason for it.
Klein had prearranged several codes for his meetings with Rhodan's people. Each code designated a specific rendezvous spot, and "QPQ" on the 6.3 megahertz band meant a small hill about three and a half miles southwest of the southern shore of the Goshun salt lake.
Hardly fifteen minutes had passed before Tako rematerialized. Rhodan and Bell had been staring at their intercom screen to observe Tako's reappearance in his room. But instead be chose to appear right in Rhodan's cabin. Bell turned around, startled by Tako's unexpected coming. Tako paid no attention to him but addressed Rhodan in an unusually excited manner. "Bad news, sir. Peking has ordered all branches of the nationalized industrial enterprises to inform their secret service at once about any of our agents. Moscow has given the same instructions to their manufacturers. And inside the NATO countries severe penalties have been announced threatening any industrial concern entering into dealings with us."
Rhodan seemed to be staring at something in the air.
"Some sly fox must have found out about our plans," Tako said. Rhodan advanced two steps, then turned suddenly on his heel and looked straight at the Japanese. "Tako! Nothing will be changed as far as your job is concerned. I am afraid, though, that you will have to proceed even more cautiously."
CHAPTER TWO
The craft started to the moon according to plan. The robots bad been busy for two days; slowly their mapped out work began to take shape. Enough field generators had been left behind in the Gobi Desert base to maintain the energy dome while the ship was away. still the moon flight vessel had taken along several of the instruments needed to foil the plans of the Third Power's military adversaries, who had started to prepare strategic manoeuvres against them as soon as they learned that the Arkonide vessel had set out on its lunar trip.
There was no work to be done during the flight. The automatic guidance system of the ship functioned according to the instructions preset by Khrest. When they were about 300 miles from Earth, the ship's radar system showed the first approaching enemy rocket. A few seconds later the rocket became visible as a flitting metallic arrow on the video screen of the direct optical observation instrument. Rhodan felt fear surge through him and could hardly catch his breath for some moments as he became aware of the ball of fire released by the exploding rocket. Only after realizing that their own ship had not been affected by the holocaust could he relax again. The Arkonide space sphere sped away from Earth with increasing velocity.
Rhodan turned around. Bell, who had been standing behind him, looked at his former commander with a sheepish smile. "That's something like Christmas or being promoted suddenly," he said with a still uncertain voice that could hardly conceal the fright be had experienced a moment ago. Khrest merely smiled in his enigmatic but friendly way. Thora did not react at all. She simply stared as before at the video screen. Another series of rocket attacks followed, at an altitude between 500 and 2,000 miles above Earth. The protective energy screen around the Arkonide craft warded off fifteen enemy rockets altogether, and the ship's crew did notice even the slightest jolt.
Then the bombardment ceased.
The ship went into orbit around Earth at a distance 8,000 miles above the planet's surface.
"Now we can start with the hypno training," said Khrest "You saw with your own eyes that the rockets cannot harm us at all. Even if they should resume their bombardment, it would not disturb you during your schooling."
Rhodan gave his consent to begin the hypno training. As soon as the overwhelming fear of a direct rocket hit had abated, be was seized once again with excitement, anxious to find out the last secrets of Arkonide scientific knowledge
The procedure was the same they had experienced already several times previously. Rhodan and Bell lay on a comfortable couch while they were connected to the information transmitters.
"It will take about three hours," explained Khrest. "This time we are dealing with extremely difficult material-difficult even for me."
He checked all connections again and asked, "Ready?"
"Ready!" replied Rhodan and Bell simultaneously,
Rhodan lost consciousness while he was wondering why Thora had not come to watch. Never would he be able to describe what he felt during the hypno training session. All he could remember later was a swarm of disconnected bits of information that made no sense. He no longer had any bodily sensations. All that was taking place now seemed to occur exclusively in his brain. But without the posthypnotic influence that would eventually render this schooling process effective, he could not have made any use of the various isolated items of new found knowledge that he could still recall.
He knew that his brain would be given a period of adjustment after the conclusion of the hypno schooling. His mind needed the rest to recuperate from the superhuman strain. He remembered that after every previous training session he had awakened refreshed and feeling wonderfully alert. When he regained consciousness with a splitting headache this time, he realized at once that something unforeseen must have interfered with the schooling process.
Khrest was standing at Rhodan's cot gazing at him with an expression full of helplessness and uncertainty.
Rhodan was fully alert in an instant. "What's happened?" he asked the Arkonide scientist abruptly.
Rhodan could hear the moaning of his friend Bell lying next to him, but he paid no attention to it. Bell would need the usual few moments to regain full awareness.
Khrest jerked convulsively. "Are you feeling ... ?"
"Yes, I am feeling splendid! What's the matter?"
Rhodan felt anything but splendid. His headache was unbearable.
"Thora..." stammered Khrest. "She has..."
Rhodan remembered that he had feared something of the kind. Thora had too quickly consented to their plan to conclude the last stages of their hypno training. He should have realized sooner that she had something up her sleeve. He rose and tore away the leads connecting him with the transmitter. Khrest recoiled as if in terror. Rhodan was amazed at the scientist's reaction. Why should Khrest be suddenly afraid of him? He wondered.
"Where is Thora?" snapped Rhodan.
"In the command center," replied Khrest meekly.
Rhodan no longer paid any attention to Khrest. The last thing he heard as he stormed out of the room was Bell's gruff voice, saying, "Go ahead, chief! I'll follow right away."
Rhodan hurried along the corridor that led to the center of the ship. He pulled his small Grinnell gun out of his belt. He regretted for a moment that he was not carrying one of the Arkonide weapons in addition to his usual protection. The small caliber bullets would hardly make a dent in the locked Arkonide door leading into the command center, where Thora was hiding. She had locked the door indeed, as he had suspected. She was not going to run any risks with these two Earthlings, whose uncanny urge for activity, measured by Arkonide standards, had frightened her repeatedly. Rhodan activated the audio communication system inside the cabin. No answer! He followed by hammering with his bare fists against the door. There was still no sign of life from the inside. He walked back a few steps to the nearest telecom outlet. He pushed the command center button and waited impatiently until the video screen lit up.
&nbs
p; Thora had been waiting for his call. Her face filled the screen. Rhodan was startled to see such fierce hatred in her eyes. Never had he encountered such violent and raw hate in the eyes of any being.
"What is going on? What do you want?" she inquired calmly. Rhodan knew that it would be useless to shout at her. The method of communication that seemed to work best with her was a display of superiority on his part. He could disarm her if he made her understand that he considers her no match for him.
"What kind of nonsense have you been up to this time." he asked her with a quiet grin.
She appeared to have steeled herself against this kind of approach. He could perceive nothing of the narrowing of her eyes that usually indicated how much she was hurt by his sarcasm.
She addressed him in her own Arkonide language, to make him understand how much she considered this her very own affair, of no concern to this poor, backward human being. "I am sick and tired of being chased about, you monkeys. That's all."
Before Rhodan had time to reply, he heard, his friend Bell approaching from a bend around the corridor. He gave him a sign with his right hand, which was outside the viewing field for Thora, asking him to stay in the background so that Thora would not see him. Bell understood and obeyed.
"Tell me," Rhodan said, resuming his conversation with Thora, "what plan have you hatched up to get rid of us?"
For the first time he could detect some signs of worry In her. "I will land on Earth," she answered, "and take matters into my own hands."
"What matters? Do you really believe for a moment that you can go out and purchase your new spaceship anywhere on Earth, ready made?"
"No, not at all" she replied haughtily. "I will force these humans to build one for me."
"Force them?" laughed Rhodan. "How?"
Thora had stepped back from her video screen so that Rhodan could now look beyond her. Suddenly, he knew how he could deter her from her crazy plan.
"You know just as well as I that this ship has enough weapons on board to deal effectively with more than ten of your type of planet."
In the meantime Rhodan had begun a feverish activity that could not be observed by Thora. He had stepped closer to his telecom set, all the while giving signs with his right hand for Bell. He pointed to the floor of the hallway, where it joined the opposite wall.
"I will land inside the energy dome in the desert base on Earth," continued Thora in the meantime, "and make the terrestrial governments understand what I want from them."
Rhodan nodded, and at the same time he continued the hand signals to his friend Bell. His index finger still kept pointing at the same spot as before, while his thumb pointed toward the video screen of the telecom set. Rhodan could not tell whether Bell had grasped what he was trying to tell him.
"I make no secret of my intention to make a heap of ashes out of your planet, if my demands are not obeyed."
"That method guarantees, no doubt, your safe return home to Arkon?"
mocked Rhodan. Now his right hand had changed the signal. His thumb pointed upward while his index finger imitated the movement of pulling a gun trigger. Rhodan broke out in a cold sweat. "Why won't you reason out this problem calmly?" he said, trying not to show his inner tension. "You want to destroy mankind if they won't fulfill your demands. What will that leave you with?
What will you do for the rest of your life? Live out your days in a miserable existence on Mars or Venus Is that the kind of future you want for yourself and Khrest?"
Thora motioned impatiently, as if to shrug off his warning "You know that mankind won't let it get to the point where they face extinction. I will make it entirely clear to them what they can expect if they don't comply with my wishes. They can't hope for mercy from me."
Rhodan felt hatred surge up in him as he heard these words. "The nations of the world will simply laugh at your requests," he countered ironically. He paused for a moment, full of silent triumph, as he heard Bell creep away quietly behind him. "They will laugh at you, then dig themselves into deep safety shelters, and you still won't know what to do to get help after you have destroyed the world with its industrial potential."
Thora seemed to grow taller as she snorted contemptuously "Mankind will do nothing of the kind! No one will agree to his own destruction if he can possibly avoid it."
Rhodan was leaning against the wall in a relaxed manner in order to show her that be was willing to have a lengthy discussion with her about this problem. "Well, that is exactly where you have the wrong picture about the human race. Don't build up your hopes too high. Those few cowards among us humans who would rather give in to you than risk their lives would not be of much help to you anyhow."
He still wanted to tell her more, but this very instant he noticed some movement beside her on the video screen. Close to the spot where Thora was standing was an opening of the fresh air duct about the size of a man's head. The air duct was a five foot wide shaft that led vertically throughout the ship, distributing fresh air into every room.
From this opening Rhodan now saw the barrel of a gun emerging, held in a big fist.
"Okay, chief" said Bell, so loudly that Rhodan could hear him over the intercom. "Turn around, young lady, and raise your hands!"
But Thora could not comply with his command. The first instant she heard Bell's voice she had started to turn around in his direction. But before she completed her turn she was overcome by fright and fainted. She fell to the ground with outstretched arms.
"Great!" bellowed Bell from the air duct opening. "That's exactly the way I wanted it. Now, shoot out the door lock before she comes to again!"
"I'll get something for this from Khrest!" shouted Rhodan, and started down the corridor, calling Khrest's name, Out of breath, he reached the information room, where barely fifteen minutes earlier he and Bell had been lying" under the influence of the hypno transmitter.
Khrest was already at the door.
"Let me have one of your weapons," panted Rhodan. "One that can shoot out the lock of the command center door, Thora locked herself in. She has fainted. If we don't hurry she will wake up and everything will have been in vain!"
Khrest spun around and Disappeared down the hall. Half a minute later he was back. He was breathing with great effort as he handed Rhodan a heavy needle ray gun. "Here take this," he urged, "but be careful with it!"
Rhodan raced back down the corridor, all the while getting the weapon ready to shoot. He stopped fifteen feet from the door of the command center, and directed the needle thin, invisible energy ray through the visor onto the electronic door lock.
The plastic metal of the door began to hiss, form bubbles and melt. A hole appeared in the heavy door, and as soon as it was sufficiently large Rhodan stopped shooting.
The door no longer offered any resistance as he pushed it open. Rhodan could hear Bell breathing a sigh of relief from the direction of the opening in the air duct. "Thank heavens! I couldn't have shot her."
Rhodan lifted the still unconscious Thora off the ground and placed her gently on one of the couches that lined one side of the wall. He activated the telecom and called Khrest.
"Come here, please. I want you to be present when she regains consciousness."
But the first to appear in the command center was Bell. He had not even stopped long enough to wipe the sweat off his brow. A wide grin spread over his broad face as he stepped through the demolished door.
"You don't know how proud I am that I could figure out your hand signals."
"You are just plain smart," Rhodan complimented him jokingly, putting on a serious air, as if he really meant it.
Khrest arrived Just then. "How did you manage that?" he asked, shaking his head in amazement.
Rhodan chuckled. "We discovered the air shaft just in time. Reg took the elevator down to the air conditioning plant and crawled up the shaft. When Thora saw him threatening her with his gun from the opening in the wall she fainted."
Khrest sat down carefully at the edge of the
couch on which Thora was resting. "I can well imagine that," he said thoughtfully. "I almost died myself when I saw you get up off the hypno couch a little while ago."
"Why should you feel that way?" asked Rhodan.
Khrest waited a few moments before he said, "Way back at the beginning of our hypno training technique, when we built the first instruments but lacked the necessary experience to operate them, there occurred several regrettable incidents when the training session had to be interrupted for some reason or other. In every case the person undergoing hypno schooling lost his mind. We found a simple explanation for this. During the training process the brain is in a condition of extraordinary activation. Unless given the opportunity to return slowly to its state of normal functioning, it becomes short circuited. The result then is a kind of insanity that even our best psychiatrists have been unable to cure."
Khrest paused for a moment and looked first at Rhodan and then at Bell. "Do you realize what I mean by that? Since the first days of hypno training there has been no greater crime in Arkon and all worlds that are subject to the Arkonide code of law than interrupting such a training session."
Khrest motioned with his head to the still unconscious Thora. "When you were connected to the transmitter, Thora felt absolutely safe from any interference on your part with what she planned to do. She knew that I would not dare wake you before the end of your schooling period. Those three hours would have been enough for her to return to Earth with the craft and to make all necessary preparations so that you would no longer have posed a threat to her."
He fell silent for a few seconds.
"But you awakened us in spite of that!" interjected Rhodan in a grave voice. Khrest silently nodded in affirmation, while looking down at the deck. "I assure you that this was not an easy decision to make. But I had to make a choice. Unless I aroused you from your state of unconsciousness, Thora would have landed on Earth and ruined all our efforts. There is no doubt that she would have brought about the destruction of Earth as well as that of this space sphere."
